In the Company of Bloggers (Again)

This weekend, I'm travelling north to Chicago for the 2009 National Main Street Conference, where I'll be part of a group presentation entitled: "Blogging, Multi-media & Bunnies: Three Things You Need Not Fear" (by the way, I didn't choose that title).

My co-presenters are Rob Voigt, author of Civic Blogger, and Cac Kamak, a planner with the City of Oak Harbor--as you can see, we all have roots in Western Washington even though Rob now lives in Ontario and I'm here in Illinois. The National Main Street Center is making a big push this year to demonstrate the value of social media as marketing and communications venues for revitalization efforts in smaller communities. As the practitioner in the group (although our Main Street program is only Introductory as yet), I'll relate my experience with blogging in Tacoma (a relatively large urban community) and, subsequently, deploying three blogs here in Columbia.

This is not my first experience covering this ground at a national conference. In 2007, Tacoma blogger Derek Young and I presented at the annual conference for the International Downtown Association (IDA). That group is where the larger metropolitan districts get together to compare notes, while the current conference is the national gathering for smaller cities, towns and villages.

One very cool element of this conference is the live conference blog that Rob and Cac have set up. Look for me there next week!